COP30 climate change talks end with no new pledges to cut fossil fuels
Despite the wishes of most of the countries there — the final wording of the deal struck at the COP30 summit made no calls for the phasing out of fossil fuels, ITV News’ Philip Sime reports
Negotiators taking part in United Nations climate talks in Brazil have agreed to deliver more money to countries hit the hardest by climate change.
Saturday’s outcome was not as fruitful as many hoped, however, as the agreement reached at the COP30 summit did not include explicit details on phasing out fossil fuels – despite the demands of many nations.
Nor did it include measures to strengthen countries’ inadequate emissions cutting plans.
Earlier, COP30 President André Corrêa warned that “everybody will lose” if the officials from more than 190 countries taking part did not find enough common ground to build on the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.The deal was approved on Saturday after negotiators in the port city of Belem blew past a deadline to wrap up the previous day.
It was crafted after more than 12 hours of late night and early morning meetings in COP30 President André Corrêa do Lago’s office.
After the main package was approved – to applause by many delegates – angry nations took the floor to complain about other parts of the package and about being ignored as do Lago moved quickly toward approval.
The objections were so strong that do Lago temporarily halted the session to try to calm things down.
André Corrêa do Lago, COP30 president, sits as Simon Stiell, United Nations climate chief, left, speaks with other UN officials. Credit: AP
Colombia’s Daniela Duran Gonzalez objected to sections on helping nations cut emissions and reaching worldwide temperature limits that were previously agreed upon.
She blasted the conference’s president for ignoring her, saying: “The COP of the truth cannot support an outcome that ignores science.”
Looking ahead, Do Lago said tough discussions started in Belem will continue under Brazil’s leadership until the next annual conference “even if they are not reflected in this text we just approved”.
Do Lago has said a fossil fuel transition plan will be in a separate proposal issued later by his team that won’t carry the same weight as a deal accepted by nations at the conference.
Ed Miliband, the UK’s energy and climate change secretary, speaks during a plenary session at the COP30 summit in Belem. Credit: AP
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the deal shows “that nations can still come together to confront the defining challenges no country can solve alone.”
But he added: “I cannot pretend that COP30 has delivered everything that is needed. The gap between where we are and what science demands remains dangerously wide.”Plenty of critics complained about the deal struck on Saturday, including Panama negotiator Juan Carlos Monterrey Gomez, who said: “A climate decision that cannot even say ‘fossil fuels’ is not neutrality, it is complicity. And what is happening here transcends incompetence,” he said.
“Science has been deleted from COP30 because it offends the polluters.”
“Strip away the outcome text and you see it plainly: The emperor has no clothes,” said former Philippine negotiator Jasper Inventor, now at Greenpeace International.
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WaterAid’s executive director of global policy and campaigns, Sol Oyuela, said that “far more needs to be done”, despite progress made on the Global Goal on Adaptation initiative to help countries improve their resilience.
“The climate crisis won’t pause for geopolitics. The floods, droughts and cyclones intensified by a warming world demand to be confronted now, not passed on to future generations,” she said.
UK Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said the agreement was “an important step forward,” but that he would have preferred it to be “more ambitious.” He added: “These are difficult, strenuous, tiring, frustrating negotiations.”
However, Palau Ambassador Ilana Seid, who chaired the coalition of small island nations, said: “Given the circumstances of geopolitics today, we’re actually quite pleased with the bounds of the package that came out.
“The alternative is that we don’t get a decision and that would have been a worse alternative.”
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“This deal isn’t perfect and is far from what science requires,” said former Ireland President Mary Robinson, a fierce climate advocate for the ex-leaders group The Elders.
“But at a time when multilateralism is being tested, it is significant that countries continue to move forward together.”“This year there has been a lot of attention on one country stepping back,” UN climate chief Simon Stiell said, referring to the United States’ withdrawal from the landmark 2015 Paris agreement.
“But amid the gale-force political headwinds, 194 countries stood firm in solidarity — rock-solid in support of climate cooperation.”
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